"Knockabout World" released on YouTube / streaming platforms (Feb. 21, 2020)

 

[Stephen Hofmann]

Moz was and is wrong about a lot of things. He hated the likes of OMD and yet their first 3 or 4 albums are brilliant. He hated Robert Smith. He never once complimented Johnny Marr's ex-Smiths work apart from inferring Marr wasted a couple of good songs with Electronic (I have to think he meant Getting Away With It and Get The Message which are absolute gems). I don't really care what Moz likes or doesn't like. He's not infallible. I found his 'Under The Influence' CD to be almost unlistenable. I'd say the same for most of the shite music he plays before he comes on stage. Just about bearable.

He was wrong about a lot of stuff but that's what music was like...it was all very tribal. Personally, I love most of the old music he's played before gigs.....but I like rockabilly and retro stuff.

 

[ACTON]

Remember the passionate, stream-of-conscious overflow of Maladjusted? All the words just pouring out of him?

I want to start from
Before the beginning
Loot wine, "Be mine, and
Then let's stay out for the night"
Ride via Parkside
Semi-perilous lives
Jeer the lights in the windows
Of all safe and stable homes
(But wondering then, well what
Could peace of mind be like?)
Anyway do you want to hear
Our story, or not?
As the Fulham Road lights
Stretch and invite into the night
From a Stevenage overspill
We'd kill to live around
SW6 - with someone like you
Keep thieves' hours
With someone like you
...As long as it slides
You stalk the house
In a low-cut blouse :
"Oh Christ, another stifled
Friday night!"
And the Fulham Road lights
Stretch and invite into the night
Well, I was fifteen
What could I know?
When the gulf between
All the things I need
And the things I receive
Is an ancient ocean
Wide, wild, lost, uncrossed
Still I maintain there's nothing
Wrong with you
You do all that you do
Because it's all you can do
Well, I was fifteen
Where could I go?
With a soul full of loathing
For stinging bureaucracy
Making it anything
Other than easy
For working girls like me
With my hands on my head
I flop on your bed
With a head full of dread
For all I've ever said
Maladjusted, maladjusted
Maladjusted maladjusted
Never to be trusted
Oh, never to be trusted
There's nothing wrong with you, oh
There's nothing wrong with you, oh
There's nothing wrong with you, oh
There's nothing wrong with you
There's nothing wrong with you

Morrissey needs to sit down and WRITE. Not just lazily ad-lib this shit in the studio and call it a day. The complaint used to be that Morrissey's band sucked but his lyrics were still great. Who could have predicted that within a decade it would be the other way around?

I think he needs to kick out the ass licking yes men. Stop paying the electricity bill. Sit in the cold, walk the streets, watch some old movies, read a couple of books, then sit down all night under a single naked bulb and write lyrics that make his hand shake. And I don't mean in a self pleasurable way. Then he needs to ring up Alain Whyte and beg him to come back.

 

[Stephen Hofmann]

I think he needs to kick out the ass licking yes men. Stop paying the electricity bill. Sit in the cold, walk the streets, watch some old movies, read a couple of books, then sit down all night under a single naked bulb and write lyrics that make his hand shake. And I don't mean in a self pleasurable way. Then he needs to ring up Alain Whyte and beg him to come back.

He could do a lot worse than hiring Richard Hawley as a producer. Hawley does Moz better than Moz does these days.

 

[ZOOM FROM GLOOM]

I'm sure we could find room for a littl'un like P&O if he promises to behave himself?

ok

 

[Flibberty]

I think he needs to kick out the ass licking yes men. Stop paying the electricity bill. Sit in the cold, walk the streets, watch some old movies, read a couple of books, then sit down all night under a single naked bulb and write lyrics that make his hand shake. And I don't mean in a self pleasurable way. Then he needs to ring up Alain Whyte and beg him to come back.

Nah. Nostalgia aint what it used to be...

When Morrissey was working with Alain, all I ever read was that he needed to do something else and to find a new band. If he were still working with him now, I think very few people would be happy about it.

 

[Mr. Jackpots]

I think he needs to kick out the ass licking yes men. Stop paying the electricity bill. Sit in the cold, walk the streets, watch some old movies, read a couple of books, then sit down all night under a single naked bulb and write lyrics that make his hand shake. And I don't mean in a self pleasurable way. Then he needs to ring up Alain Whyte and beg him to come back.

It doesn't work that way. You can't go home again, as Thomas Wolfe once said. Or, to quote Bukowski, "starving doesn't create art. Mostly it just creates dying."

He's in his 60s now. If you guys prefer the headier work of his youth, you have decades of it to revisit at will. Why begrudge him a little frivolity in his later years?

 

[MrShoes]

Nah. Nostalgia aint what it used to be...

I see what you did there....
MrShoes

 

[Anonymous]

Nah. Nostalgia aint what it used to be...

When Morrissey was working with Alain, all I ever read was that he needed to do something else and to find a new band. If he were still working with him now, I think very few people would be happy about it.

Your memory ain't what it used to be. Alain rescued Moz from being a laughing stock. Moz helped by writing some lyrics that were a bit less stupid, admittedly.

 

[MrShoes]

It doesn't work that way. You can't go home again, as Thomas Wolfe once said. Or, to quote Bukowski, "starving doesn't create art. Mostly it just creates dying."

He's in his 60s now. If you guys prefer the headier work of his youth, you have decades of it to revisit at will. Why begrudge him a little frivolity in his later years?

Yes but if it was just a little frivolity - that's one thing. It's as if there has been a general lack of interest in quality control for some time.

 

[Mr. Jackpots]

Yes but if it was just a little frivolity - that's one thing. It's as if there has been a general lack of interest in quality control for some time.

I detested the last LP...well, not all of it. Mainly the anti war songs and the absurd Arab-tinged crap that plagued the 2nd half. All I'm saying is that I'll take some lighthearted feel-good fluff over that dreck ANY day.

Morrissey is, after all, a pop singer. Pop singers sing pop songs. We only expect more from him because the first 15 years of his career were pretty flawlessly profound lyrically.

 

[Flibberty]

Yes but if it was just a little frivolity - that's one thing. It's as if there has been a general lack of interest in quality control for some time.

I don't really think so.

I mean if people dislike recent albums, that's up to them. But even way back in the 90s you had singles like Dagenham Dave and Roy's Keen.

Again, if those were being issued now, would anybody really be praising them?

 

[Flibberty]

Your memory ain't what it used to be. Alain rescued Moz from being a laughing stock. Moz helped by writing some lyrics that were a bit less stupid, admittedly.

Hardly that.

While Kill Uncle was by no means a success, some of the later Morrissey/Nevin songs are certainly strong. I've Changed My Plea to Guilty, My Love Life, You're Gonna Need Someone on Your Side, I Know it's Gonna Happen Someday etc. Let's not pretend that Morrissey could only write songs with Alain.

And the influence that Mick Ronson had on the success of Your Arsenal can't be overestimated.

There are plenty of great Morrissey/Whyte songs out there, but there is also a lot of musical (and lyrical) mediocrity.

 

[Eustace Walks]

As I've done for the others; single artwork for "Knockabout World" (I've also attached re-edited versions of the others, and an alternate LP cover). Font used is 'Harrington'.

 

[gordyboy9]

Compare this to the sublime songs on Nick Cave's "Ghosteen" album for example...it's embarrassing how far he (Morrissey) has fallen.

well go and listen to that then.

 

[Surface]

The 1975, Shane Ritchie’s boy I think

Matty is Tim Healys son, I’m off to the MEN to see them this coming Friday.

 

[Surface]

I don't know who Matt Healy is but he sounds dull. Morrissey is a legend

He’s the singer in one of the biggest bands in the UK and US right now.

 

[Uncleskinny]

I don't know who Matt Healy is but he sounds dull. Morrissey is a legend

Oh my. This is very special indeed.

 

[Anonymous]

Nope. Sorry. There’s no more room.

P&O back on the Ferry more like!

 

[Anonymous]

Cliff Richard

Quiff Pilchard something fishy about 'im!

 

[gordyboy9]

anybody know why knockabout world isn't on alexa and yet bobby and love is are.